Our next stop was travelling north to Khao Sok: an area inland with a huge national park. We had decided to try public transport and so got a songthaew (basically an open air truck) to the bus station only to find the bus station wasn’t open and the bus might come at “some point” during the day, not at the time on the timetable. After some negotiation with the driver, we agreed that he would drive us the hour trip there. It was pretty bumpy but it did mean that we got full view of the scenery on the way up which was pretty impressive. Anyway, we arrived much earlier than anticipated but the lovely people at the Khao Sok Paradise Resort were great about it and our treehouse was ready. We were given a short talk on the animals we might see including which ones were dangerous and then taken to our room where after a few minutes we were joined by a guest.

First he sat watching us and then got pretty persistent about coming very close. With the nurses advice when we had our rabies shots ringing in our ears, we beat a hasty retreat inside as soon as he hissed at us( who knew a long tailed macaque could hiss?) He was pretty insistent that he wanted into the treehouse, pushing the door and pacing up and down as if he owned the place! Callum, of course, had to wind him up through the window but after a few more hisses he gave up which was lucky as we had to go out on our canoe trip.

We were picked up in another songthaew and headed off . We had thought we were canoeing ourselves but it turned out we were just along for the ride. After initially been disappointed, it was actually rather lovely to be paddled along through the rainforest spotting the wildlife and greeting the locals playing in the river. We fed some protected fish and had coffee on the river bank in bamboo cups made on a fire Laet made there and then. (This was the closest Callum could get me to doing the survival experience overnight excursion). We saw kingfishers, heron like birds, heard the monkeys and saw a mangrove snake asleep in the tree above us All in all, a lovely few hours.

The following day we went on a day trip to Cheow Lan Lake which had been formed when the Thai government created a dam to generate power for the south of Thailand. We did actually get to canoe this time, as well as go on the speedboat, a raft, a trek through the rainforest with the guide and in a cave with lots of stalagmites and stalactites. We saw some horn bills, a wild boar, monkeys and a tarantula spider trap door. We were on the lookout for leeches but only saw the very bloody outcome of one on the only man in long trousers! He was not impressed. A great day despite being the oldest by 20 years- we were proud to be at the front of the pack on the trek though quite a few young ones didn’t even do it! The Scottish contingent couldn’t believe the waste of money!

We did one more trek in the National Park on our own the next day which was rather lovely if somewhat sweaty. The waterfalls we saw were nice but having been to Plitvice in Croatia we were hard to impress.

Callum has been happy to have seen a snake every day for the past 5 days – albeit mostly from a safe distance however we had a sudden change of plans and so are now at Karon Beach on Phuket at the Centara Villas enjoying a bit of luxury in our own separate villa and an upgrade to an ocean view!